Surprise! Conventional Agriculture Can Be Easier on the Planet

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Surprise! Conventional Agriculture Can Be Easier on the Planet

* Photo: Yann Arthus-Bertrand/Altitude * The path to virtue, we all know, begins with organics. Meat, milk, fruit, veggies — organic products are good for our bodies and good for the planet. Except when they're not good for the planet. Because while there may be sound health reasons to avoid eating pesticide-laden food, and perhaps personal arguments for favoring the organic-farmers' collective, the truth is that when it comes to greenhouse gases, organics can be part of the problem.

Take milk. Dairy cows raised on organic feed aren't pumped full of hormones. That means they produce less milk per Holstein — about 8 percent less than conventionally raised cattle. So it takes 25 organic cows to make as much milk as 23 industrial ones. More cows, more cow emissions. But that's just the beginning. A single organically raised cow puts out 16 percent more greenhouse gases than its counterpart. That double whammy — more cows and more emissions per cow — makes organic dairies a cog in the global warming machine.

How about that burger? Organic beef steers take longer to achieve slaughter weight, which gives them more time to emit polluting methane. And if you're eating hamburgers made from grass-fed cattle, don't award yourself any prizes just yet. While pastured beef offers some environmental benefit — these cows don't require carbon-intensive corn for feed, and the land they graze stores carbon more efficiently than land used for crops or left alone — they're burping up nearly twice as much methane as cattle fed grain diets, according to the UN's Food and Agriculture Organization. If you really want to adopt a climate-friendly diet, cut out meat entirely. Researchers at the University of Chicago showed that the meat-intensive diet of the average American generates 1.5 more tons of greenhouse gases per year than the diet of a vegetarian.

But even organic fruits and veggies are a mixed bushel: Organic fertilizers deliver lower-than-average yields, so those crops require more land per unit of food. And then there's the misplaced romanticism. Organic isn't just Farmer John; it's Big Ag. Plenty of pesticide-free foods are produced by industrial-scale farms and then shipped thousands of miles to their final destination. The result: refrigerator trucks belching carbon dioxide.

Organic produce can be good for the climate, but not if it's grown in energy-dependent hothouses and travels long distances to get to your fridge. What matters is eating food that's locally grown and in season. So skip the prewashed bag of organic greens trucked from two time zones away — the real virtue may come from that conventionally farmed head of lettuce grown in the next county.